A few folk have asked about setting up business in Spain. The answer comes in two parts:
- Bring lots of cash
- Brace yourself for dealing with Telefonica
Spain’s answer to the black market is to tax anything that moves and a lot of things that don’t. There are fees for everything and anything you can think of, including the duplicated, triplicated and generally insane paper ridden bureaucracy. But there is another reason you needs lots of cash.
Telefonica – I’m sure there are blogs about this rapacious company. My Spanish chums in Madrid tell me that whole sections of the news are sometimes devoted to the dreadful service they provide. If you need ADSL and who doesn’t then make sure it is available before setting up. Theoretically, the installation should be automatic and on a first install things are usually smooth. But if, like me, you moved, you’re in trouble from the get go.
I don’t need their extra costly installation services. I know how to cable up a router. What I didn’t know is that if all you need is for the line to be DSL enabled then they don’t tell you when it’s done. You’re expected to know. Similarly, the wireless router they supply loses its config settings after any amount of unplugged time. In my case 8 weeks. And, when they install the router first time around, they don’t provide the customer with the settings information or any instructions about hanging onto whatever scrap of paper the installer used the first time around.
They also don’t tell you that when they eventually send out an engineer, because you’ve reported DSL as not working, he won’t have a clue about the config settings either. He thinks you know. Or that you need to speak with the third party router supplier to get either a fresh username and password or beg for a new router. Why they can’t simply put these instructions onto their website seems to escape them. Why they can’t stamp the default settings onto the router is also beyond their wit. Why their engineers don’t carry spare parts is another mystery. And, whether you like it or not, they charge every time. All of this after 13 phone calls being bounced around from one person to another. On this point, you need decent Spanish or the service teams will simply refuse to speak with you and bounce you back to general service enquiries until you eventually find a service operator civil enough to try and solve your problem. Which usually starts the process all over again.
The flip side of this badly bent coin is that Telefonica have to charge extortionate line and call fees to stay in business. As soon as I can find a way of only paying Telefonica the absolute minimum, they’re gone.
You’ve been warned. Hasta lueogo!
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